perhaps it is even
perilous--that interests so grave and so gigantic should fall for their
guardianship into hands so incompetent and so petty. It may be an
inevitable accompaniment of our Parliamentary system that the naval
debates should be so conducted; if so, one must put it down as one of
the evils which must be taken as part of the price we pay for the
excellences of a representative system.

[Sidenote: Sir Edward Reed as an alarmist.]

I may dismiss the debate on the Navy with one or two further
observations. Sir Edward Reed, though he knows a good deal about
ships--for he has had something to do with them all his life--is not an
authority whom one can implicitly accept. He is not a politician who has
prospered according to what he believes and what are doubtless his
deserts, for he is a very clever man, and politicians who are a little
disappointed have a certain tendency to ultra-censoriousness, which
damages the effectiveness and prejudices the authority of their
criticisms. Thus, Sir Edward has been always more or less of a pessimist
with regard to the doings of other men. On August 28th he spoke in
decidedly alarmist terms of the lessons which should be taught to us by
the loss of the "Victoria." Speaking with the modesty of a mere layman
on the subject, I should have been inclined to think that the chief
moral to be drawn from that terrible and tragic disaster was the
terribly important part which the mere personality of the individual in
command still plays in deciding the fate of hundreds of lives; that, in
short, the personal equation--as it has come to be called--- is still
the supreme and decisive factor in all naval enterprises. But there may
be some grounds for the alarmist views of Sir Edward Reed, and I see no
reason why his views should not receive prompt, candid, and independent
investigation. The officials may oppose such an investigation; but
officials are always optimists, and the cold draught of outside
criticism does them an immense deal of good.

[Sidenote: The Grand Old Chieftain and his tactics.]

At an early hour in the evening there was a very significant question,
and an equally significant answer. Sir Charles Dilke called attention,
with characteristic adroitness to a weapon which the Tories placed in
our hands for dealing with such an emergency as that by which we were at
the moment confronted. It was Lord Salisbury who made the most excellent
suggestion that when a Bill had gone